Man 'used chatrooms to groom teen girls for sex'

A 41-year-old man used internet chat software to groom children aged 11-14 to
perform sex acts, often using a false identity to trick his victims into
believing he was a teen girl, according to an indictment served in the Petah
Tikva District Court on Sunday.

The man, who cannot be identified because
of a gag order, allegedly carried out the assaults on young teenagers over an
11-year period, starting in 2001 until his arrest earlier this year.

In
one of the charges, the defendant talked to one 13-year-old victim about
performing a sex act with a dog.

According to the indictment, the
defendant created several false identities, usually of young girls aged 14-16
named Shiri, Gali, Alona and Natalie.

In some cases, the defendant
allegedly pretended to be a teenage boy named Tomer.

In most cases, the
indictment said, the defendant would introduce himself over the internet as a
teenager, usually a girl slightly older and more experienced than his
victims.

After gaining their trust, the defendant began to sexually
assault his child victims, asking them to talk about their sexual development
and offering to teach them about sex, the indictment said.

Allegedly, he
then sent the girls photographs of female genitalia, which in some cases he said
were pictures of himself, and asked them to reciprocate by sending him photos of
themselves in the nude.

The defendant asked some of his victims to
masturbate and gave them explicit instructions on what to do, even sending some
of the children sexually explicit videos, the indictment said.

One of the
multiple charges on the indictment allegedly took place in 2009, and relates to
one of the complainants, known only as Alef, who was then 13.

After using
chat software to contact Alef on the internet, pretending to be a teenage girl,
the defendant began to sexually harass her, talking explicitly about sex and
asking Alef to perform sex acts on herself, the indictment
said.

Allegedly, when the 13-year-old girl told the defendant she was
“way too young” to have sex, he said she must get ready for sex and he would
help her learn, at one stage telling Alef he was considering having sex with a
dog, asking her if she had a pet and suggesting a sex act she might perform with
it.

The indictment said that during his conversations with Alef, the
defendant sent the child pornographic photographs of a lesbian sex act, and
claimed that the pictures were of him and a girlfriend. At one point, the
defendant allegedly convinced Alef to send him explicit photographs of herself
during a video chat.

The defendant sent those photographs of Alef to
other minors he assaulted, claiming that he was Alef, the indictment
alleges.